


Day One

by guardsguards



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Gen, One Shot, Project Black Wing, Referenced Human Experimentation, Teenage!Dirk, Trusting Cinammon Roll Dirk, but as usual only a very very brief mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-12
Packaged: 2018-09-23 19:59:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9673859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/guardsguards/pseuds/guardsguards
Summary: Dirk finds himself free from the CIA at last, with very little idea of what he's supposed to do next.





	

The charm of being ‘on the run’ wore off after the first hour or so of trekking through the wilderness. At the CIA, they’d ensured that Dirk stayed fit, but spending thirty minutes a day on a treadmill didn’t really compare to walking outside in the sweltering summer heat. Dirk had been stuck in the research facility for so long that he hadn’t even realised it was summer outside.

He patted the as-yet uncounted wad of cash in his pocket, stolen from a desk drawer during his escape. Dirk was starting to realise that the money wouldn’t be of much use to him if he didn’t come across somewhere to buy food and water soon. Thanks to a particularly unpleasant round of testing the previous year, Dirk knew exactly how long he could be starved or dehydrated before becoming delirious. It wasn’t an experiment that he wished to repeat.

By the time he spotted signs of human activity, Dirk’s vision was getting hazy, and he initially mistook the lights in the distance for stars. Stars that were unusually close to the ground, that also blinked on and off in a rather un-star-like fashion.

Upon closer inspection, he realised that the lights came from a motorway service station. Or at least, from whatever the American equivalent of a motorway service station was. Dirk had lived in America for close to ten years, but being locked up in an underground research base wasn’t the best way to acclimatise to a foreign culture.

After a few more minutes of walking, Dirk was stepping into the gloriously air-conditioned service station. Once the relief wore off, though, he realised that he was attracting curious looks. Apparently, teenagers these days didn’t usually sport dirt-stained white scrubs, with the word ‘Icarus’ printed in black letters over the left breast. New clothes, he decided, would be his second priority. After getting something to eat.

Fortunately, the universe had decided to repay Dirk for nine years of imprisonment with the existence of an all-you-can-eat buffet at this particular service station. A shuffle through his wad of bills told Dirk that he had just over $200, and his eyebrows shot up.

Two hundred dollars, he thought, would be enough to live off of for years.

 

* * *

 

After spending $25 on food and drink, Dirk was rapidly coming to the realisation that money was worth a lot less than he had initially thought. He wasn’t too worried though, because he’d found something much more important than money at the all-you-can-eat buffet. Dirk had found a friend.

“I just can’t believe that somebody your age hasn’t even heard of The Simpsons. I’m sure they have it in England, too,” Sarah was saying, and Dirk couldn’t stop grinning even though he hadn’t the slightest clue what she was talking about.

“We have Postman Pat in England, is it like that?” Dirk replied, through a mouthful of macaroni cheese, “I haven’t watched much television, not since I was little, but I liked Postman Pat.”

“Oh, I’ve heard of that, it’s a kids’ show, right? My kids are more into Spongebob,” Sarah replied, accompanied by one of her delightful laughs. Dirk thought that Sarah must be a very good mother, considering how she seemed to be a very good person. She’d said that she worked in market research, which Dirk assumed was very different to CIA research because Sarah was nothing at all like the researchers Dirk knew.

Sarah was also giving Dirk a look that the researchers at the CIA had never given him. If Dirk had been more practised in social situations, he would have identified it as concern.

“So where is it you said you’re going?” she asked.

“Back to England, preferably,” Dirk replied, setting down his fork when he felt he really couldn’t eat another bite. He’d been on perfectly calculated rations at Black Wing, so feeling over-full was an unfamiliar sensation.

“And do you have family in England?” she pressed, to which Dirk nodded, then hesitated, and shook his head. Dirk didn’t notice the way Sarah frowned, too caught up in his own thoughts. “How old are you, Dirk? You never mentioned.”

“Sixteen,” Dirk replied brightly, then did a quick calculation with his fingers, “Oh, actually, seventeen. That somehow sounds a lot older, doesn’t it?”

“Seventeen isn’t very old, you’ve got a lot of years ahead of you yet,” Sarah said, and once again she was wearing that unfamiliar expression as she continued, “Dirk, why don’t I give you a lift to the nearest airport? It’s not too far from here.”

“You would do that?” Dirk asked, eyes wide, “For me?”

“Sure. Just… Why don’t you go and pick up some proper clothes, okay? I just need to run a couple of errands here, and then we can head off.”

Dirk’s bright smile widened, somehow. Smiling wasn’t something he’d done much of in recent years, but it came quite naturally. If everybody outside of the CIA was like Sarah, he thought, he’d be smiling all the time.

 

* * *

 

A short while later, Dirk wandered out of the bathroom, his CIA outfit stuffed into a trash can and replaced by a slightly scratchy button-up shirt and a pair of black trousers that hung too high around his ankles. Service stations didn’t really offer much in the way of fashionable attire, but Dirk thought the ensemble looked pretty good, all things considered. Plus, it had been nice to look at himself in a mirror without worrying that there were researchers watching him from the other side of it.

He was in the middle of wondering what Sarah’s errands involved when he spotted a shop selling paperbacks. Books, Dirk decided, would be as essential as clothing if he was to travel all the way back to England without getting horribly bored. Fortunately, the service station had a surprisingly wide range to choose from.

After a moment of consideration, Dirk decided that the Young Adult section was right for him. After all, he’d been constantly reminded by Dr Patel that he wasn’t a child anymore, but he certainly didn’t feel like a proper adult yet. It didn’t take long for a book to catch Dirk’s eye, the flashy ‘Best Seller’ sticker plastered to the cover making it stand out.

“The Jacobius Chronicles, volume one,” he read aloud as he picked it off the shelf, flicking to a random page and reading the first paragraph.

_“No, Jacobius,” Lucrietta cried, “The village elders would never allow it. Besides, I’m betrothed to Baelem!” Lucrietta thought of how Baelem had looked as he picked apples at her father’s orchard, all rippling muscles and sparkling brown eyes… but somehow her thoughts still drifted back to her new, forbidden lover. Jacobius may have been half-bat and half-man, but Lucrietta believed the mysterious oracle who had said that their love was destined to be._

It was certainly different to the books Dirk had been allowed at Black Wing. And there was something oddly appealing about the shirtless man pictured on the front cover who – judging by the bat wings – was the titular Jacobius. Well, he reasoned, it couldn’t hurt to try something different.

When Dirk exited the book shop, he was down to about $150, and happily oblivious to the confused look that the cashier had given him when she saw his book selection. Dirk hadn’t had access to a new book in years, so it was worth dipping into the budget a little to buy one.

Luck seemed to be on his side for once, as a few moments later, Dirk heard the newly familiar voice of Sarah. She must have finished with her errands, he thought.

Or perhaps not. It looked like Sarah was on the phone to somebody, her back turned to Dirk. He could only just make out what she was saying over the din of passers-by.

“No, he hasn’t done anything _illegal_. I honestly have no idea what his situation is, he seems a little…. I don’t know, he could be high on something. He’s dressed in sort-of hospital clothes? And he says he’s only seventeen, but he’s just wandering around on his own.” Sarah paused, apparently listening to whoever was on the other end of the line.

Dirk felt a little ill.

“No, not Svlad. He told me his name was Dirk Gently… Yeah, I suppose he could be lying about that. It did seem like a strange name. Look, I promised I’d drive him to the airport, so I could just drive him down to you instead?”

Dirk didn’t stick around to hear the rest. His feet were unsteady beneath him as he hurried to get out of the service station, chest feeling tighter than it had earlier after hours of walking.

He’d been right, he thought, Sarah was nothing like the researchers at the CIA. They’d never pretended to be his friend, never smiled to his face and then betrayed him behind his back. Sarah was much worse.

Dirk stared out at the sea of cars in the parking lot, and the highway that stretched out all the way to the horizon. The possibility of getting a lift to the airport was gone, and walking hadn’t worked out well for him so far.

“I suppose,” Dirk murmured resolutely, “I’ll just have to learn to drive myself.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed it! 
> 
> For the purposes of this fic, I've imagined that Dirk was taken in by the CIA around the age of eight, hence why he's more than a bit clueless about the workings of the real world. When Dirk is older, he probably realises that Sarah was only doing the responsible thing. 
> 
> Also, Dirk becomes a lifelong hardcore fan of The Jacobius Chronicles. He owns every book and scoffs at the terrible film adaptations. 
> 
> Comments and kudos are appreciated as always! If you enjoyed this, you can check out my tumblr (gentledirkly) for updates and prompt fills :D


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